


Canary Through the Looking Glass

by Merfilly



Series: Slade Verse [1]
Category: DCU Animated
Genre: Alternate Universe, Mirror Universe, Multi, Star-crossed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-16
Updated: 2012-09-16
Packaged: 2017-11-14 09:43:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/513896
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merfilly/pseuds/Merfilly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Black Canary falls into a world where the heroes are the bad guys, and the villains are the good guys. While she just wants to go home, she gets caught up in the drama of that conflict... and more.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Canary Through the Looking Glass

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was originally begun in 2006. It has been revised a few times, and I am not backdating it because I can't decide WHICH revision date to use. 
> 
> The characters are based on the Timm-verse Justice League and Teen Titans GO! series, with some comic material used to further flesh them out.

Dinah had landed with a thud and a feeling of sick disorientation. She could hear combat nearby, and that was enough to force her to her feet. She figured the odd energy portal she had fallen through had likely just skipped her around the scene or staggered her a bit in time, as she remembered fighting members of the Injustice Society just before it happened.

Taking off at a run, Dinah made it back to the scene of the action, and saw that the civilians still had not been cleared from the fighting. Her combat senses, finely honed by her time fighting on Gotham's streets, and more recently with the Justice League, took in the danger to a pair of bystanders nearby in the form of a falling lamppost. She leaped forward, getting at the right angle to knock it away with her cry.

"Run Michael! It’s the Black Kestrel!" the woman cried to her companion, turning to flee the scene. Her friend backed away, in terror for his life by the look on his face, but Black Canary could not deal with that just yet, her mouth open to knock the pole the other way. It so happened that Star Sapphire was just passing by, and the pole neatly clipped her ankle, taking her from the fight for just a minute.

"Good job, Kestrel! Now get back in the fight!" This shout registered as coming from Plastic Man, making her almost balk; since when was he so sharp and disagreeable? He sounded almost as bad as Batman. Then the name registered, and the abject fear of the civilians at seeing her. Her pretty blue eyes showed the confusion she felt, as the continuing disorientation added to her chaotic thoughts.

//Get a grip, Dinah,// she thought to herself, opting for discretion as she fell back to the line of buildings to analyze the fight. She watched as Star Sapphire was helped back up most gently by the Shade. Her eyes took in the subtle (and not so subtle) variations in the costumes worn by her 'friends' of the Justice League, and those worn by the Injustice Society. She was also assaulted by the brutality being used by the Justice League in their efforts to take the Injustice Society down. When Green Arrow had a hunting arrow drawn on an unsuspecting Cheetah, center mass, she knew she had to act. With a short Canary Cry preceding her, she threw herself back into the fray, protecting Cheetah from the man who looked so much like her current boyfriend back at home.

Her action threw the entire battlefield into disarray, as the Injustice Society had no idea if they could trust Kestrel, and the League felt they had been massively betrayed when Emerald Archer was thrown far from the field. Ultra-Humanite salvaged the situation with one quick command.

"DISENGAGE!" His shout was heard and obeyed as neatly as if Martian Manhunter had given a recall to the League, Canary noted, even as she felt hands on her.

"Pardon me, Kestrel, but we need to interview you," a power-suit clad Luthor informed her, before flying away with her and the rest of the Society. For better or worse, Canary did not react or fight; she just hoped she could extricate herself if she had read things wrong.  
`~`~`~`~`

They did not take her to a base or anywhere that might compromise security for them. And, in the end, only Luthor and Circe remained with her, as the rest felt a low profile was in their best interest right now. Black Canary looked at the pair with every sense trained on high paranoia, wondering if this was the fire or the frying pan.

"Black Kestrel, you have presented us with a strange dilemma," Luthor began, walking around her as he studied her costume. "You are not wearing your traditional costume, you protected innocent citizens, and you saved Cheetah’s life. So, pray tell, how are we to take you, when you are generally one of the more feral fighters of the Legion of Doom?" His blue eyes regarded hers with patient searching.

"First off, the name is Black Canary, and this is my ‘traditional garb’ handed right down from dear old mom." The saucy little blonde tossed her head, and the stray curling lock came to rest over one eye, presenting her with the age-old sex appeal of the silver screen legends. "Secondly, this is obviously not my home dimension, as your little witch friend is over there determining even now."

"She speaks truth, Alexi. She is out of harmony with this world, in many ways." The sultry sorceress looked Black Canary over with an interest that defied mere curiosity. "She carries no stain on her aura, as the Kestrel does."

"Then the question becomes, what do we do now, with her?" Luthor had a slight smile tugging at the corner of his lip; Canary was an enticingly built woman. Circe must have noted his preoccupation for she gave a small snort of disdain.

"There are no spies tracking her, so let us take her to the hall, and allow Faust, myself, and the others to find a way to return her home." Circe stepped forward and offered Black Canary her hand as she summoned a flying disk. "Come, dear. I can tell you have need of hospitality." For the second time that day, Canary accepted a flight from one she knew to be of the worst villainy imaginable, in her home world.

`~`~`~`~`

For some reason, she had half-expected to find a dome-shaped refuge in the middle of a swamp. Instead, the pair took her to a building none too far from what was the United Nations Headquarters in her world. When she mentioned that to Luthor, he informed her that it belonged to the League of Nations, giving her a slight clue as to when the time line of this dimension had diverged from her own.

The pair flanked her into the high rise, which seemed to serve as corporate offices for the most part, hosting company names she could vaguely link in her experience to people she knew in her realm as ‘the bad guys’. Circe eyed her briefly as she was reading the plaques along the hall entrances, subtly scanning her impressions.

"Kes…Canary," the sorceress began. "In your world…there are two sides, good and evil, yes?"

"Of course, Circe." The petite powder keg looked at her hostess. "It’s just that…there, I’m the good guy, and you are not." She spoke gently, moderating her bluntness with a careful control of tone.

"So I surmised, from the way you are still holding your body in a defensive state." Circe smiled sadly. "There must be balance, always. I suppose for every dimension that I follow the True Path, I must have an alternate that takes me from the graces of Olympus."

"Religious mumbo jumbo." Luthor’s tone was as haughty as Canary recalled from his bid to make president in her world. "Every human, every being, has the tools to be what they make of themselves. It is environment that shapes the potential, but innately it is their choices that steer their path."

Canary looked at him with the serious consideration her Sensei had taught her to use, weighing his words against his face and eyes. "That is quite possibly true, but it does not preclude Circe’s reasoning either." She smiled, and found, like with many other men, it precluded an argument, as he found himself drawn to her again on more basic terms.

The trio had walked steadily, taking an elevator down into a surprisingly welcome environment below the building. They were passing men and women along the way, who eyed Canary with open distrust, and in some cases, hostility. Luthor moved just slightly closer to her, as if to lend his presence to her as a shield, and she found herself honestly touched by his gallantry. Once they reached their destination, a large briefing room with the assembled leaders, she was sure she was going to need all her training to keep her composure to answer their questions.

The diminutive Canary stood in front of a semicircle table, her eyes and other senses focused on the seven members facing her. She noted that Luthor had found his customary detachment, with the slight air of arrogance she associated with him, but he and Circe remained at her side. The seven members she now faced were evidently the current Council of Heroes Against Masked Perpetrators, known to the world as CHAMP.

Luthor had informed her in a low voice that the council changed according to the top seven at large villains.

She saw Count Vertigo, introduced to her without title on one end of the table. Star Sapphire, giving her just the hint of a bruised ego for the earlier incident, sat at his side. A man introduced as Monarch, who looked for the entire world to her like a moth-man, had the next seat. From the other end, she saw the man she knew as Devil Ray, but whom they called Manta Ray. At his side was the gentlemanly Shade, and next to him came Black Adam, a person she knew only by his files. At the center of this maelstrom of weirdness was a man she had heard to be of the highest caliber of deadliness in her world: Slade. He was the current leader, and had the respect of all his teammates, working under the name Deathstroke the Terminator.

"Black Canary, as Circe says you call yourself, we have asked you to meet with us, so that we can decide the best course of action." Black Adam was speaking, as Slade and the others watched her. "Circe is convinced you do not belong to our word, that this is no trick by the Legion to plant a spy in our midst. We can only assume, from what we know of inter-dimensional travel that your counterpart, Black Kestrel is loose in your world. For that, we offer our sincerest condolences."

His words made her consider, for just an instant, what she might have turned out like without the strong sense of right and wrong her parents had given her. She knew how deadly her voice could be; in training to use it, there had been accidents that hurt people she cared for. A tiny shiver went over her spine as she decided she really did not want to pursue the thought. It did not go unnoticed, as Shade gave her a sympathetic look.

"We have several scientists in our roster, and other magical beings, so a solution can be found. We just do not know how long this might take." Black Adam’s eyes caught hers, holding them with the unconscious charisma of the gods. "Being that you apparently come from a world that parallels our own in a mirrored vision, we feel we must ask if there is any way you can assist our efforts to curtail the rampant lawlessness of our metavillains. Despite having captured and contained some of the worst members of the Legion, we are nowhere near making this world safe."

"Please understand, we know that this must seem underhanded to you," Vertigo offered at her look of shock. "We’re not asking for intimate details of those you know in your world. We could not ask you to conscience such betrayal of the people whose secrets you hold." The look on Slade’s face disagreed with that opinion, but she was fast pegging him as the Batman of this particular team. "All we ask is for tactical information, on the methods they use for fighting and planning, not personal weaknesses or anything along those lines."

"I don’t know much about those kind of things. I tend to work alone, mostly." She smiled softly, recalling her shared adventures to date. "I don’t get personal if I can help it, and I’m relatively low on the Justice League roster."

"Then the parallels aren’t that strong," Monarch commented. "Here, your counterpart has held the most wanted villainess rung ever since Power Woman was captured by her race."

"Excuse me? Me…I mean, her? I’m just a martial artist with a nifty trick." She put a hand on her hip, standing in her provocateuse pose. "And I have a voice that can knock you down," she added. Black Manta actually had to stifle a laugh at that, as he took in her seductive look and stance with appreciation.

"Black Canary." Slade had a voice that made her shiver deep inside her soul, Canary discovered, as she turned fully to face him, her stance moving back to a defensive one. "Any information you would be willing to share would go a long way to saving lives. You must deal with metahuman threats in your own world; the details of the battle today made it apparent you know team tactics." His one good eye bored into her, as if reading her mind and intentions. "Don’t let any innocents fall prey to a misplaced urge to protect secrets." He stood and nodded to the rest before sweeping out.

"I suppose that is the end of this meeting then," Black Adam said, allowing Circe and Luthor to escort their guest to quarters.

`~`~`~`~`

Luthor was the one to suggest using the computer, with limited security access, to show Canary what they were facing. Ultra-Humanite agreed, provided Monarch monitored her closely. Luthor had a laptop prepared, and took it to their guest, inwardly pleased to have a reason to visit her alone. That pleasure was quickly stilted as he came across Slade, walking in the same direction.

"We rigged a laptop up to give her access to historical records of our battles with the Legion," he told the enigmatic ‘super-soldier’. "Perhaps that will convince her to aid us with what information she does have."

"Good idea, Alexi." The one-eyed warrior continued on his way, but held his hand out for the computer. "I’ll deliver it to her." Luthor squelched his immediate rebuttal; he had led the team for quite some time before finally finding a way to capture the Big Three, and now he tried to give Slade Wilson the same cooperation he had received during that time. While the Terminator had been the first to take up the battle when Ultra Man appeared, Luthor had been the one to crack the secrets of that problem.

"Of course, old friend." Luthor left Slade to his errand, uneasy but unwilling to harm the working relationship with the one man that combined high intellect and extreme skill in one form.

Slade never even paused, too intent on gaining Canary’s cooperation. His sure footsteps carried him to the small room they had given her. He paused at the door and knocked briskly.

`~`~`~`~`

Black Canary had been looking over pictures Circe had given her, studying the way that this world’s Kestrel varied from herself. Her first impression was that for all she played her own sensuality up, this version just went straight for trashy, as her costume left very little to the imagination in any manner. Then she noted things like the way her face sneered in the casual observation photos, or the way she seemed to radiate violence in the combat stills. It caused her to shudder, just before the knock on her door made her jump.

"Dinah Laurel Lance…you need to settle down," she whispered to herself, standing to go answer the door. She composed herself, laying a silent bet that it was Luthor come to talk to her, or it was one of the various ‘heroes’ with a grudge against Kestrel come to challenge her. When the door opened on the visage of Slade Wilson instead, she silently kicked herself for the way he made her nervous. It was not as if she were some wet-behind-the-ears rookie. In fact, her path had almost crossed Deathstroke’s in her own world, when the JLU had been called to Jump City to help the Teen Titans battle an army of his robots. "Why hello, Mister Wilson," she said, keeping her voice in the sultry range she cultivated. Better to find out at the outset if he was affected by her siren act, she decided.

"Black Canary." His matter of fact tone struck down that idea, she decided, moving on to the more professional voice she used.

"Can I help you with something? Luthor gave me reason to understand I’d have the evening to myself to rest." She stepped back from the door, and he followed her in, holding out the laptop as the only explanation he needed.

"Look over the news clips on the ‘Net from the past ten years, and then ask me that question again." His hard tone was like a wall to her; she was used to men being almost putty in her hands. This man, with his looks that reminded her eerily of Green Arrow and manners like Batman, was a tough nut to crack. He set the laptop on the desk, and then took a seat in the chair opposite it, in no mood to make a quick exit. Canary sighed softly, perching on the edge of the chair behind the desk to google up the information as directed. While she became absorbed in what she had found, he merely watched her out of his one remaining eye, his expression inscrutable.

Canary was finding that the villains of this world were, if anything, more maniacal than the ones she was accustomed to dealing with. The atrocities that Ultra Man, for instance, had committed, were in a league only obtained by Darkseid in her world. It made her feel some sympathy to the plight of CHAMP, but she still felt curiously bound to safeguard the secrets she did hold of her fellow heroes back home. Then she found the article on the meta children.

In her home dimension, several heroes had taken to mentoring the gifted young heroes known as Teen Titans. Headquarters and equipment was funneled to these groups of youths, and the more minor threats were given to them to deal with. Sometimes, minor threats had become big ones, as when the father of one girl had menaced the entire world, but the Titans were a strong group in the face of severe odds.

In this world, with the viciousness of the bad guys going a step higher, the various meta children had been abducted and forcibly molded into soldiers for the Legion of Doom. They had been set loose to commit crimes and cause chaos, before a final gambit devised by Owlman. This army of children known as the Young Offenders had been mass teleported to the site of CHAMP’s last known embassy. The heroes had not wanted to fight them with full force, and had tried to subdue them carefully.

Then the Emerald Archer’s protégé, Scarlet Arrow, had blown up.

And that was just the beginning of the horror for the heroes, as they tried desperately to save their young opponents from Owlman’s devices.

Black Canary covered her face as she looked away from the computer screen. It was too much for her to bear, as she thought of Green Arrow’s young friend, Speedy. Batman’s protégé, Robin was good friends with him in her world. Here, a boy that must have been Owlman's student had been watching when the archer boy had exploded.

She would have nightmares for weeks about the Titans being misused in the name of global anarchy.

"I’ll help you, Slade. Just promise me this." She met his gaze intently, the tears she had refused to let fall still glistening there. "Promise me you aren’t bent on controlling this world, once the threat is subdued." She had been well briefed on the Justice Lords, on what they had done in the name of setting right the wrongs of their world, and feared that with a man like Slade at the helm, that the situation here would go the same way.

"I just want to know my daughter can grow up and not wind up like her brothers," he told her firmly, standing from the chair. "I’ll see you in the morning…. Miss Lance." Before she could question his knowledge of her name, he strode from the room, leaving her to her thoughts.

`~`~`~`~`

As committed to helping as she thought she was, Canary almost had a sick feeling that this world was beyond help when the world crashed in on her before the sun had even risen. It was bad enough that the disoriented feeling had never left her. Now, between the building shaking and alarms blaring, she came awake with the gut instinct to flee. Not from cowardice, but from the need to get some distance, weigh her options, and then hit where it did the most good. That option did not follow through in the game book, though, as Wildcat's teachings were brought to bear over top of Sensei’s. It prevented her from being knocked solidly unconscious, and let her roll under the blow to her feet.

She was facing a trio of fighters that she could not immediately place, until she saw small owl-like insignia on them. Briefly, she recalled seeing a dossier on Owlman, this world’s Batman, and figured these were their henchmen. She drew in her breath, feeling the tingle of her throat as she prepared to unleash her Cry. The trio moved apart, as if to lessen her effective strike against them, and she merely concentrated on her radius. The vocal weapon lashed out at the thugs, and she noted all too late that they were smiling.

Canary felt her power turn back on herself, assaulting her ears, her bones, her muscles. The momentary paralysis of the sonic waves on her nerves was overcome by the raw power flinging her back into a wall. She might have shrugged it off and kept fighting, but her head struck the corner of the desk as she slid down, further dazing her. The trio of henchmen were blurring as she looked up from the floor, making her see anywhere from two to twelve of them.

"Bagged the bird, Lady Owl," one reported, as the chaotic sounds of battle drew somewhat closer. "Roger that. On our way." The trio moved professionally through the motions of containing their dazed captive, getting her up the shoulder of the largest man. Hurriedly, while the strike team kept the other members busy, they made their way up and out of the rubble of their entry point.

"Drop her." The two words were calm, cold, and inarguable as naked steel flashed in front of them, blocking their escape with the prize. All three felt their insides clench as they faced the one fighter in all of CHAMP who had no qualms about ‘necessary force’.

"Sorry, Terminator…but not today," the big one said, to pull attention. His two partners released smoke and concussive grenades, but neither that nor the distraction cut Slade’s focus. He moved in a series of lightning swift strikes that left the two down and the big guy running with his burden, deprived of any cover. Slade’s one eye narrowed, and then he threw a small device out. It took flight, and landed on the shoulder of the half-conscious woman, where she hissed at its needle sliding into her skin.

`~`~`~`~`

Blue eyes opened slowly; she realized she must have blacked out in transit, after struggling with the bonds they had put on her. For a wry moment, she imagined this must be how Wonder Woman felt at times like these. Then she put that thought aside; Wonder Woman would not have gone down so easily, or underestimated goons sent by one of the Bat family. Now she was paying, hanging by waist, wrist, and ankle from some kind of upright slab.

"Nice of you to join us, Little Bird." The voice was feminine, unfamiliar to her. She brought her eyes up slowly, seeing black boots, skin tight black leggings (armored, she wagered with herself), on up into a body suit of black with the Owlman insignia off center over the left breast. A flaring cape and cowl set it off, but luscious red curls were escaping the bottom of the cowl.

//Batman has a girlfriend, according to urban legend. Nightwing won’t confirm or deny it to Speedy; pretty safe to say this confirms.// The petite crime fighter refused to show anything or say a word, waiting instead on her captor.

"I had hoped to have longer with you, my pretty, but I am afraid your petty little leader over there for Chump has spoiled my plans. See, I know he put a tracer on you; I found the obvious one."

//Whatever hit my shoulder…Slade’s tagger?// Canary thought, but said nothing.

"The problem is, he is a man using far too much of his brain. So I know there is another one, and I have not been able to discover and disarm it." A wicked smile touched her lips. "So he will find you. Just how much and how well you are depends on you."

//Here it comes; vindictive little villain speech. Wonder what this girl is like in my world?// She kept her eyes on the woman with the barest hint of interest on her face.

"I have a tiny little task for you, Little Bird." She stepped forward and held up a syringe. "One task, and I’ll set you free, alive, for Slade to find. But, first…a little insurance that I have your cooperation." She brought the needle to bear on Canary’s arm, causing Canary to wince as a thick liquid was pushed into the vein. "See, that is a special little nano virus, remote controlled. You do my bidding, and I turn it off. Do not follow my wishes, and it will engineer your very DNA into a plague that will kill you. And likely seventy-five percent of those bearing certain genes in common with you…the ones that make you a hero, Singer."

"Blackmail, huh? Here I figured the Owlboy had competent stooges," Canary finally said, earning herself a resounding slap across the face.

"DO NOT DISPARAGE HIM!" the cowled woman shrieked, rabidly going on the defensive for a moment, before abruptly altering her face and body language to a more professional mien. "You will do as I wish, Birdie, and you won’t go begging help to find a cure. I’ll know, and I’ll set it off. Within forty-eight hours, every person bearing a meta gene will be sick or dying." She smiled ever so cruelly. "Besides, it is a very little task I ask of you. Merely acquire the location of Owlman’s prison."

Canary was running through the possibilities; if she could get returned home quickly enough, then she could ask for help there, from the JLU. Her thoughts must have shown, because the woman in front of her laughed.

"If I do not send a signal every 24 hours, the virus will begin building, Little Bird. If I detect that you have told anyone our insurance policy, I will begin the virus. If you fail to deliver by one week from today, I will begin the virus." Her eyes sparkled with the plan she saw unfolding in her mind.

"Why in the hell would you want to bring the man back when you could just take his place?" Canary asked flippantly. She was as unprepared for the woman’s rage as she had been for the backlash she had received earlier in the night. The stinging blow from earlier was nothing compared to the solid right hook that put her back under, to await a rescue she would most assuredly hate having needed.

`~`~`~`~`

The feel of strong masculine arms under her back and legs made her rouse slowly, every nerve in her face and body seemingly on fire. She bit down on the whimper of pain she almost loosed, aware as her senses returned that this was not Oliver Queen carrying her out of danger, but a man who was a stranger. A hero that had willingly, knowingly let her be captured to further his own plans.

"If my arms did not feel like dead weight, I’d hit you right now," she murmured, her lips very close to his ear as she rested her head on his shoulder. "Thank you for not putting my head on your bandoleer."

"Tell me you would not take advantage of a situation in your own tactical way," he challenged her. She grimaced; she knew she was guilty of manipulating people, especially men, to get her goals covered. She had learned too well from her mother how to use her shape, her voice, and her looks to her advantage. "And, you are welcome." His matter of fact tone kept the courtesy from stunning her, but she still had to glance up to be sure it was the right person. Sure enough, the mask was a total blank on the profile she could see. She closed her eyes, trying hard not to get a perverse thrill from being carried by this dangerous man. She was almost disappointed when he set her on a stretcher outside the building.

Of course, the ride back to a new safe house was far too much time to think about the psychotic woman’s little deal. Canary had no reason to doubt the capabilities of the science involved, even if she was not a tech savvy hero. She could blab, and hope they could isolate her fast enough, but she could not help but think it was too big a gamble. She had overheard Mr. Terrific once theorize that even the so-called non-powered heroes actually had latent meta genes, which accounted for their superior ability to train up to peak human. She could not conscience the risk of death to so many people, knowing that the loony woman had likely developed a vaccine or protection against it for her own people.

"What do I do, Dinah?" Her barely murmured question drew no comment from the man minding her vital signs in the back of the ambulance. She was left to muse on it and decide what to tell Slade. She knew he would be the one to question what exactly had happened, and she would have to be careful in what she said as the Terminator was said to be a master of reading the unspoken words.

As that realization struck, she began to get a glimmer of the way out. If she could just figure out how to convey the message by not saying the right things, she might just survive this without betraying anyone or herself.

`~`~`~`~`

It was Black Adam and Alexi Luthor who wound up talking to her after her injuries were treated in the infirmary. She found herself disappointed that Slade was not there, and had to firmly squelch the images of the older, dangerous man swooping to her rescue. She really needed to break that habit anyway, she decided.

Alexi looked Dinah over, shaking his head at the bruising and the bandages. "Black Canary, do you always lead with your face?" he questioned. "It seems most self-abusive."

"Actually, I lead with my mouth; the face just kind of follows." She managed a small smile for him as he stood at her side. Black Adam was the surprising one; he actually perched on the side of the bed she was on.

"I do apologize for the lack of security we provided you, Black Canary." His eyes were gentle, and she remembered hearing that Captain Marvel seemed to carry around a gentle soul with true definitions of good and evil. "And we hope this has not changed your opinion of us negatively." His eyes were searching hers, and she got the impression he was testing her, making sure that this was not some elaborate plot to put a cuckoo in their nest.

"Adam, I swear I don’t hold it against you or your group that I got taken. I’m usually a better fighter than that." She grimaced. "Just don’t seem to be at the top of my game today…yesterday, whenever." That sickening disorientation just would not let go of her, and the blows to the head were adding to it.

"There, there, Canary; I’m sure it was the unfamiliar setting." Luthor reached out and stroked a thumb down the side of her face, lightly enough to avoid causing any pain. "But, if you could help us a little with the details of your short term incarceration by our foes…" Both he and Black Adam looked expectantly at her, and she could only hope this was being recorded so Slade would see. As smart as Luthor supposedly was, she just did not think he would pick up the verbal or body clues she was about to lay out. After all, he was actually affected by her siren act, and it would blind him a bit.

"Well, let’s see…I was sleeping and then fighting three goons. They used some kind of device to bounce my Cry back at me directly, amplifying it, I guess, since I can usually hear it without problem. That dazed me and let them get the upper hand." //Terminator, question why I would tell you what you probably already know.// She picked at the covers on the bed, looking down from their eyes. "Then I felt a stinging in my arm and passed out, I guess."

"And then?" Adam’s prompt was a bit more curt than the avuncular persona he had been projecting at her, and she felt he was possibly catching her nervous act, though Luthor was ignoring it.

"I woke tied up to a slab of some kind with a psychotic redhead babbling at me."

"What did she say?" Adam asked as Luthor held up a photo of Lady Owl.

"Is this the psychotic in question?" he asked, holding the photo in distaste.

"Yes." Canary looked at the photo, then down quickly. "She said a bunch about wanting to know why I betrayed them and then admitted that I had a tracer on me, before she punched me again until I passed out." She glanced up at Luthor, turning on a shy look for his benefit. "Then I woke in Wilson’s arms." She almost enjoyed the way Luthor’s jaw clenched at that, confirming that she had at least one man here hooked. It helped her ego, when her fighting skills were letting her down. With a small whimper, she pushed down on the pillow. "Please; I’m tired. When I remember more, I’ll tell you."

Black Adam stood, and both turned to leave. "Rest well, Black Canary," the nigh-immortal chosen warrior of Shazam said.

`~`~`~`~`

Slade looked up from his notes on the abandoned lab they had found the Black Canary in. Black Adam entered a second after that, shaking his head just slightly.

"You need to review the tape. It does not add up." The taller man watched as Slade pulled up the appropriate commands on his console. When Slade sat back, steepling his fingers in front of him, Adam took a perch on the desk near him, watching the screen closely.

"She’s hiding something." Slade reviewed the scene without sound once, and then added the dialogue. "Something was said or done." He watched it one more time, reviewing the body language closely. "Get Faust or Circe in here, Teth. I need their skills while the lady sleeps."

`~`~`~`~`

Dinah was just saying goodbye to Alexi, her eyes bright and warm as the man gave her another smile, when Circe came in. The sorceress's purple hair was eye catching, Dinah decided as she leaned back into her pillows.

"You should be careful with Alexi. He may not openly believe in my ‘mumbo-jumbo’, but he is under the influence of a grand vision given to him," the sorceress told their guest. "It is prophesied that he will meet a woman who was once his enemy and give the world a savior."

"I’ve never been his enemy."

"But we took you as Black Kestrel at first." Circe smiled at her kindly. "And you are blonde."

Dinah snorted. "Not really, but okay…I’m warned about him. I promise you not to hurt him, or abuse his notions."

"I did not think you would." The magic caster came close, stroking her hair. "Besides, you will not be here long enough to provide a child. This dimension may reject you, as you do not belong here, or we will find a way to send you home."

"Home." Dinah felt a lump in her throat, thinking of all the things she did, the friends she had made, and Green Arrow. As she envisioned the archer, she also saw the man here they called Emerald Archer, drawing back to fire a killing blow on Cheetah. She was going to need therapy for that one, she decided, just before she felt the intrusion of thoughts concerning the Terminator, and the way he made her stomach knot up.

"You think of a love. You will be with him soon enough." Circe moved away. "I came to see if you needed anything." She surreptitiously wound the loose hair she had snagged around a finger as she kept her hands behind her back.

"No…I’m actually ready to be up and about." Dinah never had to convalesce very long; she suspected it was more of her unique heritage.

"Soon, dear. More sleep for you now." The sorceress waved her hand, and Dinah’s eyes became very heavy.

"Yes, sleep."

`~`~`~`~`

Circe returned to the chantry she and Faust had worked together to build, finding that he had made all the necessary preparations for the spell they had devised. At her nod, he crafted a minor illusionary spell, one that would hide their true doings in case the Legion’s magic users were paying attention to them at this time.

"Does Slade suspect the good girl act?" Faust questioned Circe.

"I do not think so. You know his motivation against Kestrel is a deep one, and yet he personally oversaw the retrieval of this woman." Circe had decided on her initial investigation that Black Canary was a good woman.

"That, my dear Greek, is merely his leadership. He cares not one whit beyond doing his job to his fullest potential." Faust laughed softly. "In fact, outside of his reactions to Kestrel, I’ve never really seen much emotion in him."

"You were not with us when Kestrel corrupted his boys. You would not know the full depth of his hatred for her." Circe remembered those awful early years, with Slade growing colder and colder at every failed attempt he made to rescue first Grant, and then Joseph, from the woman who had perverted everything they might have been.

"They say she is the one who cost him his eye." Faust accepted the strand of hair, imparting it into the scrying potion.

"No one knows for sure, only that he lost it during a battle involving her and the elder of his sons." That had been a minor loss to Slade, for Grant had died at Kestrel's hands in that battle, after his father had managed to sway Grant back to the proper side.

Circe added just a few more items to the potion and began the incantation that would let them ghost into the Canary’s dreaming mind, and hopefully find what she had hidden so poorly. Failure would not set well with her, or her longtime friend, Slade Wilson.

`~`~`~`~`

The dreamscape of each mind was a highly individual place, as each person organized their thoughts in vastly different manners. When Circe slipped into the panorama of the Black Canary’s dream, she had no idea what to expect, and opted to keep herself cloaked from the dreamer, observing without participation, until she adapted. She witnessed a very urban setting, one she slowly placed as being Gotham City. As she looked around, she saw a very grim scene of people walking around, obviously sickened by some plague. The sorceress hunted for the subconscious representation of Black Canary, but could find no blonde vigilante anywhere. That made her look harder, and she began noting nearly every corner had a flower shop. This struck her as odd, and she floated ethereally into one

There she saw a black haired woman steadily arranging flowers, then setting them into the cooled cases, only to see them wilt away. Her eyes were sad and red-rimmed as she did, softly whispering that it was all her fault that so many were sick. She looked into a mirror, and then Circe understood; the reflection was that of Black Canary.

The sorceress explored this portion of the dreamscape closely, looking for all the clues she could find. The florist had a calendar book open, and within held a strong clue. It was the Owl insignia, with a big question mark next to it. Circe was almost positive she could guess the nature of Black Canary’s release now, and could give Slade a position to start from.

`~`~`~`~`

Black Canary was released from the infirmary the next morning, glad to be given a task, even if it was merely filling in as many details as she could on potential identities of the villains still at large. Monarch was in the information control center with her as she did so, reassuring her that she had been lucky in her encounter with Lady Owl.

"The woman is completely insane, almost inscrutably so. A brilliant mind; she was a forensics expert at one point in time, in Gotham City. Somewhere along the way she met Owlman and gave herself heart and soul to his cause." Monarch sighed softly. "She was my first ever case, and we have crossed paths so many times, I lost count."

"I have no information I can share with you on her. She’s an urban legend, or at least, her counterpart is. I’ve never crossed her path, and I'm a resident Gothamite." Canary smiled warmly at Monarch, having recognized a mindset in him that was too familiar. Often when a hero had repeated run-ins with one specific villain, there came a bond that defied logic. What the villain was or did became part of the definition of the hero’s life pattern. Monarch was trapped in that bond with his nemesis.

"That’s okay…I’m enjoying piecing it together on my own." He turned back to the computer he was using, monitoring her typing on the files they had opened to her. He watched as she gave name, profession, and suspected habitat for the Emerald Archer’s counterpart, and smiled to himself; apparently the worlds ran fairly similar. Neither he nor the busy woman truly noted it when Slade Wilson walked in, with a cursory glance her direction.

"Monarch." His voice startled the techno-geek, but Canary kept typing, focusing intently on doing what good she could for these people. "Status on the world guests?"

"Secure. Citizen Alpha has been testing his confinement more often, but is still showing a lack of power. Citizen Beta, on the other hand has been very quiet, and very still. It is as if he is concentrating hard on deciphering his predicament." Monarch chuckled. "His lady could never be that still if we got her in the Slab."

"That’s enough, Monarch. Code words, at all times!" The rebuke was sharp, and made Monarch grimace.

"Sorry, Slade." The very competent computer and gadget freak shrugged. "I get carried away when I’m trying to map out her patterns."

"Don’t let it happen again." The cold man forged out of the room, ready to await the next move by the chess pieces on the board.

`~`~`~`~`

Dinah could not sleep. She had the information wanted by the demented Lady Owl, but her ethics were chewing away at her. On the one hand, she was a walking plague bomb, capable of killing more people than she had ever saved. On the other, she could only shudder at the thought of an evil Batman on the loose. She had not worked much with the Bat in her world, but, being from Gotham and working just under his radar there, she had heard enough on how scarily thorough he was. Take that and strip away the dedication to good…She just did not want to contemplate the results.

"Momma, what would you do?" She did not often ask the ghost of her mother’s memory advice. They had been estranged for far too long, and she had never been close before that. But, when it came down to it, the senior Black Canary had made hard decisions, even including ones that ultimately led to the death of the man Dinah had been seeking ever since: her father.

Since sleep was elusive, she went to the laptop that had been brought for her use, a different model from the one destroyed at the last base of operations the night of her abduction. She started scanning this world’s science articles, news of note in the meta community, and other things, trying to find a shred of hope that Lady Owl had bluffed her. As she did, it continued to eat at her about which decision to make.

`~`~`~`~`

"So the little bird has a conscience," Slade murmured to himself. On one screen, he was surveying her room without a care to the privacy issues involved. On another, he watched the replay of the briefing she had given, more and more convinced she had acted odd on purpose, to try and relay a message she could not tell. A third screen held the current camera view of Owlman’s cell. Briefly, he considered the fate of Jack Napier, the man who had been horribly disfigured and become slightly demented in his pursuit of the infamous criminal. He then recalled the death of District Attorney Dent in the final solution that had netted the Owlman for justice. There was no way Slade was going to let the man escape on his watch. Instead, he would see Monarch’s Lady Owl captured, if the little bird would just play her part as bait.

`~`~`~`~`

It was fairly early the next morning when Star Sapphire came to Dinah’s door to wake her. Dinah opened the door with a fitful stretch, wearing the thin cotton pajamas Circe had loaned her.

"I thought maybe you might like to go out and buy a few things, to tide you over until we get you home," the other woman offered. Dinah had to blink a few times to piece it all together and then she smiled.

"Nice, but I left my credit cards in my other world," she joked.

"Oh, that is no problem. We have a discretionary fund of donations to use for you." The woman held out her hand to Dinah to shake. "I’m Carol, by the way." Dinah shook the hand politely, and then nodded.

"I’ll meet you in the mess after I shower and dress." She then groaned. "Do you know any short people who can loan me some civvies?"

"Check your wardrobe; I doubt Slade would have overlooked that detail in assigning you this room." With that, Star Sapphire went on her way, and Dinah slumped into the door jamb.

"Always him." She went back over the current leadership of this group, and tried to draw lines from the leaders to their rogues. She knew Monarch was Lady Owl’s, and she could assume Vertigo was, what did they call Ollie? The Emerald Archer’s, she remembered. She seemed to remember Star Sapphire had a thing for Green Lanterns, while it would be obvious to pair Manta Ray to her world’s Aquaman. Shade seemed to be similar to the thief that Flash sometimes complained about, and Black Adam shared a connection to her world’s Captain Marvel, if she remembered her briefings. That left the Terminator, or Slade, as she knew him from files the Titans had cobbled together over the years fighting him. She began to wonder if maybe this world’s Robin, no, Nightwing, had the same running duel here as in her own world. Then she recalled the words of Monarch in their first meeting.

"Then the parallels aren’t that strong. Here, your counterpart has held the most wanted villainess rung ever since Power Woman was captured by her race."

Dinah shook her head, clearing the fuzziness of too little sleep. There was no way in hell she, or her counterpart, rather, could rate a nemesis on par with the Terminator. She returned to her room and walked to the wardrobe as instructed, and sure enough there were clothes inside it for going out casually. The nerves on the back of her neck prickled ever so slightly as she realized they were her exact size, and all in colors she typically wore.

"Obsess much?" she whispered, going to take a shower and remove images of the potently dangerous man from her mind.

`~`~`~`~`

Shopping was typically a way Dinah could relax and forget about superhero hijinks for a time, but her nerves were flicked raw by knowing the hidden danger she posed. In contemplating her situation, she had also struck the possibility that her world might be trying to get her back, and then ran down the avenues of what that might do. If she did not face Lady Owl’s threat soon, she could endanger more than these familiar strangers; she could harm her loved ones at home. As much of a loner as she was, she had grown very close to Ollie, and had to admit a slight warmth toward Huntress and Question. The big guys, or original seven, held her respect, and many of the back up people like herself were good, honest folks just trying to do right with their powers or abilities.

"You’re distracted, and not in a good way," Carol mentioned after pausing to watch a pair of good-looking guys. "You have totally ignored the meat market factor of the day." That got a small laugh from Dinah as she nodded.

"Sorry, thinking of home." That was some of the truth, at least.

"You are involved there?" Carol smiled knowingly. "Wait, our bad guys are the good guys there, so let me guess…" She seemed to ponder as Dinah’s cheeks turned just slightly pink. "The Archer, right? We have rumors that Kestrel and he are an item."

"Ollie and I have an understanding, at present." Dinah was loathe to admit that the man was thick under her skin, and yet she still felt pulled elsewhere. That was something she was not about to admit here to Carol, though. Rationally, she knew it was just her father figure, masochistic delusions kicking in that kept drawing her thoughts back to Slade. "He’s a great guy, real believer in his particular dogma, but if his eyes had hands, every female member of the Justice League would have sued him by now."

Carol laughed at that, her eyes merry. "He is a rake, even here. One of the few villains who actually takes the time to notice how the heroine kicking his behind is dressed." They kept walking toward another clothing shop, with Dinah now more talkative about a subject they were both experts in: men. Neither was fully aware of the surroundings, though neither woman was oblivious either. The appearance of thugs and gang members surrounding them was met with surprise, but battle reactions came online instantly as they went back to back inside the predatory circle. "Calling for back-up," Carol said softly, hoping Dinah would hear her.

"Look, girls, we only want the short one." The speaker moved closer, to try and grab the intended victim. "We don’t want to hurt you, Legs." He leered for just a minute at Carol, dressed in a miniskirt and matching blouse.

"Too bad, because I want to hurt you." With that, she launched a vicious kick his way, and Dinah exploded into action behind her. The group of thugs was prepared, being of higher caliber than they appeared, as they matched the women in hand to hand. Carol did not dare go ‘super’ and blow her secret identity, but she was a mean fighter nonetheless. Even before taking the lead of CHAMP, Slade had seen to the physical skills of his teammates.

"Hope that backup is close, because theirs is here!" Dinah shouted to her partner in defense, seeing a fresh team of six, these obviously wearing the emblems of the Owls on their clothes. Carol had just taken in this news when the click of a taser guided her attention back to her own fight, a second too late. The massive dose of electricity shorted her mind out, and she fell in a twitchy heap. The others closed the gap on Dinah, whose lungs were full of air, but the knowledge that too many bystanders could be hurt if she Cried right now.

"Get her!" The pack of thugs brought a taser, a net, and even a billy club to bear, as they prepared to subdue the feisty vigilante. Dinah weighed options, and decided there was only one way to take control now.

"I surrender. Just leave my girlfriend out of this." The blond fighter put her hands out wide, standing in submissive pose for just a moment before her wrists were caught and jerked behind her. A strip cuff followed, and, humiliatingly, a gag. The thugs menaced the crowd as they marched her out of the mall, satisfied that they would have a good payday.

`~`~`~`~`

Slade touched his ear piece as it crackled and came alive.

"They’re walking her out now, Wilson." Star Sapphire’s voice was groggy. "And you owe me a dinner and spa treatment for that."

"Bill me." He scanned the area around the mall, hoping he was correct that Lady Owl would be in the area of operations. He had a full team assembled to try and track movements if the goons separated and tried to lose tails, and he still was reading a tracer from the irradiated isotope he had tagged Canary with. "Strike Team Bird Watch, on your toes," he ordered over the secure comms. "If we lose her, I will not be pleased."

"We read you, Terminator," Luthor replied, vaguely amused by the proprietary way Slade had about him, concerning their guest. He had come to see that Canary was not the woman of his own prophecies when Circe pointed out that Dinah would likely never be able to stay in this dimension, but he still thought she was very easy on his eyes, and would have been a welcome diversion.

Slade looked out into the teeming masses and applied all the data Monarch had given him on Lady Owl’s modus operandi. He figured that the bright daylight was enough to force the woman to take it into the alley ways or a building, and only hoped the way things were supposed to go, by her playbook, would mean that the meeting place would be fairly empty.

He noted the abductors exiting the building into waiting vans. As he had predicted, they did a quick shuffle off with their bound captive, trying to confuse onlookers. His quick eye saw Canary be pushed into the first van, and he quickly activated his link to alert the others. He moved then, using the rooftop express.

`~`~`~`~`

Lady Owl looked at her captive with amusement while the henchmen removed her gag.

"Well, well, well. Look at the little bird dressed in the clothes of her former paramour’s choosing." Lady Owl indicated the clothing with a dismissive hand. "I always thought Kestrel overplayed herself on that particular escapade, but we gained two valuable, and expendable, assets. Of course, it did earn her the most lethal of the so-called heroes for her own worries."

"Lady, I’ve got no idea what you are babbling about." //MY GOD! He fell for me, her?! That's got to be wrong...// She managed to keep from flushing as the unbidden thoughts of what it must have been like if he had been seduced ran through her mind. "Why did you kidnap me? You said the end of the week!" She tried hard to keep her glare pinned on the psychopath, but she was feeling just a slight prickling.

"I got restless. I know they move them around a bit, to keep them disoriented, and prevent rumors." Lady Owl walked close, her well-manicured nails coming to grip Canary’s chin. "Do you have my information, or must I, say, step up the game a notch?" Her green eyes were hatefully cold.

Dinah shuddered; she still had made no clear choice. Lady Owl observed her, and gave a triumphant shriek.

"You know! You little mangy bird, but you know!"

Further conversation was preempted abruptly by the sound of breaking glass and fighting in the outer corridors. Lady Owl’s reaction was to hiss and reach for her belt, but Canary knew a rescue when she heard one. Her leg snapped out despite her awkward position with her arms still bound behind her, and caught the villainess in the elbow. Lady Owl grabbed at the painfully bruised area, and Black Canary used her momentum to change position, lashing out with her other foot almost in the instant her first kick descended to the floor. This time the flat of her foot caught Lady Owl across the chin, knocking her back with disorienting force.

"Stay down!" Canary could not break her habit of fair play, giving the warning. When Lady Owl decided to try and roll even as she reached for her belt once more, the Cry that erupted was enough to shatter more glass and unnerve the two henchmen that had come back into the room to aid their boss.

Unfortunately for Canary, Lady Owl’s technical savvy had nullified a good bit of that blow. Just like when she was kidnapped the first time, Canary’s cry failed to either throw or disorient the woman. This time, however, the sound was taken and modulated into eerie, discordant fragments that assaulted the original wielder.

"You fool! Do you think I would not be prepared to defend against the powers of my allies! Especially the little bitch that keeps trying to climb into the bed of my man?!" Lady Owl seemed to have forgotten whatever was on her belt as she took the opportunity to berate her opponent. "I will take pleasure in seeing such an imbecile die on her knees!" Now she did reach for her belt and make contact, as Canary struggled to clear her mind of the haunting echoes of her own shattered Cry.

"Not today, Lady." The distinguished voice coincided with a viscous black force rising up and catching both the woman’s hands, forcing them out and away from the belt. "Quickly, Faust!"

"Permissum nusquam obduco!" The mage threw something at Lady Owl’s feet as he incanted the spell. It puffed and there seemed to be a cloud of infernal energy surrounding the woman.

Behind the mage came Circe and the Terminator. He watched the magic cage around Lady Owl who was desperately trying devices from her belt for a moment, then glanced at Canary.

"Circe." It was a quiet command.

"I am sorry, my friend." Circe cast her own spell, a variant on the one Faust had used, and Canary felt herself confined just as a small tank of air and breather was set beside her feet.

"Use the air if you begin to feel faint," Slade said just before the magical barrier cut off sound. The petite blond could see her foe was already panicking at being not only enclosed but also cut off from fresh air. Nor had they given her a canister, a fact made clear as the air in the tiny area was used under the waiting eye of the Terminator. Canary was not made to watch; Shade lifted her own confinement with her and her air in it, heading outside. Circe followed him, while Faust remained with their leader.

`~`~`~`~`

Canary sat on the bed in her sealed environment, swinging her feet. It had been most of a day since they had brought her here, and begun running tests. Luthor was the head of the team working on isolating the nano-virus. With Lady Owl captured, and the barriers hard at work keeping Canary isolated, Hector Hammond had gently intruded into her mind to find out the details of her hostage situation. Based on what they had found on Lady Owl, and Canary’s own tale, they were working against the clock, to beat the nano-virus before it was supposed to receive the stop signal again.

Luthor glanced up as the science bay door opened to reveal Slade. He was able to observe as the white haired super soldier stared long and hard into the cell protecting them from Lady Owl’s engineered disease. The genius wondered what exactly was going through Slade’s mind as he stood there well over a minute, just watching her. When the older man finally did move, it was to come straight to Luthor.

"Progress? Monarch says the last signal was sent eighteen and a half hours ago." He kept his voice gruff and professional, which amused the inventor and scientist to no end. He was beginning to have a glimmer of the idea that Slade had seen something he truly liked. With the complicated history of Black Kestrel, Slade, and Slade's two sons, Alexi was surprised, but Black Canary was as far from that little problem in personality as was possible.

"I can isolate it, even design a nanite to combat it directly. But, the chance of the pathogen still being released remains high. There is a strong possibility that short of introducing superior antibodies before it goes active that it will escape her and mutate exactly as she was told. In other words, because it has had time to bond to Miss Lance’s cells, it presents both a technological and biological threat." Luthor looked toward his patient, and was unsurprised to find she had turned to face away from Slade.

"Superior antibodies?" Slade’s one eye narrowed before he too looked that way, and saw the petite crime-fighter lay down, her back still toward him. "I presume, due to the nature of the disease, that the antibodies would have to be given in a transfusion of compatible blood cells?"

"Yes. The blood type would need to match her own, for the cells to be adequate to the task of helping my nanites eliminate the virus." Luthor looked back to the microscope he was studying his latest design under.

"Then she is in luck." Slade began rolling up his sleeve. "Take what you need to cure her, and destroy any left, Alexi." His words drew the genius’s attention back. "I have reason to know we are compatible." His face betrayed nothing, even as his perfect memory played over the deceitful relationship that had been but a ruse to lure him away from his calling. Black Kestrel had played both generations of Wilson men...befriending Grant, coyly playing up to Slade in his grief for his wife, and eventually fully seducing Joseph.

"I cannot guarantee anything," Luthor warned.

"Except that she will die, and leave a corpse carrying an agent capable of decimating our world," Slade said coldly. "Do it."

Luthor stilled any retort as he went to get his tools for taking blood. If nothing else, he would get a brief look at the chemical layout that made Slade nigh immortal and vastly superior to the majority of the human race.

`~`~`~`~`

It was Luthor who gave her the shot, Luthor who explained that it was a two-part attack on the nano-virus that was just beginning to intrude on her full awareness. She had developed a fever, which caused the scientist to decide against further tests and just plunge on to using the hopeful vaccine. But it was Slade who came to hold vigil as the cure and virus warred within her. He stood outside the cell, his one eye fixated on her as she tossed and turned in delirium, muttering things in such a base Gotham accent that Slade could tell exactly which neighborhood she had grown up in.

Circe came to see her as well, disturbed that the plans to return her to her world had not truly come to fruition. She and Faust and the others they knew could not find a way of magic, while Grodd and his associates had not managed to find the path through science. She took one look at the stiff back of Slade, and wondered if Canary leaving would really be such a good thing after all. Her presence had drawn him slightly out of his mission-mode, and that gave Circe hope for the super soldier.

She wound up leaving well before the fever broke, as had most of the lab staff. No one was present, save him, when the blonde’s body locked up briefly, and then relaxed into true sleep. The enigmatic fighter operated the test probe, getting a sample of her blood to find out if they had been successful. His lips set in a line, he watched as the scanner came up negative for the pathogen. Now he just had to see if the serum in his blood had harmed her in any way. Alexi was fairly sure that he had eliminated the insanity of adaptation, by carrying it into her blood with nanites designed to break the body's resistance to foreign chemicals. Taking only the precaution of setting the field to his voice command alone, he walked into the cell Canary slept in.

His silent footsteps let him approach the bed undetected, until his presence just over her made itself felt. She stirred, eyes darting open with the restless fear of a person jarred awake.

"Calm, Black Canary." His voice held no emotion, but even just waking from a fever, she knew it was odd that he should be the one there. She tensed and tried to sit up, feeling the bruised-all-over feel of the aftermath of the fever. She also seemed more aware of the tiny details, like the hum of the energy barrier keeping her in, and the scent of the man standing so close. That scent grew stronger as Slade reached down, lifting Canary up long enough to help her settle into a sitting position. She flinched away from him, even as a part of her longed for the safe comfort she imagined he could give her.

"You have some nerve being in here," she snapped, keeping her voice low. "Such a conniving son of a … "

"I did not harm her, and I’ve done all I can to alleviate the results of this on you," he cut her off. "What a monster he must be that you could think I would kill a woman I had nullified as a threat."

"You were suffocating her."

"I had no other means of insuring she did not set loose whatever plan she had used against you. You did a good job of warning us; you should have trusted in me." He caught her chin, turning her face up to look at him. "You trusted me enough to get the warning through. That bit of play acting for Luthor and Black Adam was aimed perfectly."

"I…" She was looking into his eye, reading the sincere admiration for her abilities there, and her bitter retort became petulant instead. "You used me, twice."

"And now, the world is slightly safer, until some other crackpot, would-be-despot psychopath climbs into her throne." He released her chin, turning to walk away.

"Why, Slade? Why did you personally handle this situation?" Her voice almost cracked as she asked, and she silently cursed herself for a fool. He paused, his back rigid once more.

"Because you are what I saw in her before the charade ended. And maybe, when you go home, you will be able to make things right for his sons, as I failed mine." With that, he walked on out, leaving her to brood in misery.

`~`~`~`~`

"…. think we have her," came a distant, foggy voice. "Increase the power, Mister Terrific…."

The disorientation that had plagued her seemed to lift, and yet Canary felt a rift in her spirit as she materialized in the medical bay of the Watch Tower. She could not be sure, but she had thought she had glimpsed Slade coming back before her reality wavered and cut off the view of the door opening.

`~`~`~`~`

Kestrel immediately launched herself off the bed she was on, no longer sedated as she had been before the switch. She bounced right off the energy shield and looked up into the one remaining eye of her nemesis and former target.

"Damn this and damn my luck," she murmured.

"No...just damn you, Kestrel," he said coldly, his disappointment that it was not Canary translating to anger. At least with Kestrel in custody, he could feel free to break from CHAMP for a time, and concentrate on his personal life and company.

`~`~`~`~`

Canary watched as the Big Seven left her alone, and slowly rose from the chair in her room, going to use the comm station for a call to Titan Tower.

"Speedy…yes, it's Canary. I need your help. Can you find out if you have any male Titans whose last name is Wilson?"

`~`~`~`~`

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to all the people over the years that encouraged me to keep writing on this, as it was my first major serial event.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [The Making of an Arch-Villainess](https://archiveofourown.org/works/5941113) by [Merfilly](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merfilly/pseuds/Merfilly)




End file.
